One If By Land

My Top 3

 I noticed today that the Old North Church has gone modern, replacing the old lanterns with LED lights.  Some things should never change, so if you hanker for the old lantern that Paul Revere used in the Old North Church (”one if by land, two if by sea”) to warn the colonists that the British were coming, you can now have your very own Dietz lantern.

We got ours about a week ago, but it wasn’t an impending British invasion that sent me on the search to find one.  No, it was a power outage caused by a wind storm a couple of weeks ago.  We were without electricity for several hours.  We lit candles in each room and drug out the battery-powered flourescent light to find our way around.  The candles made us nervous, however; we would blow them out when we left the room, or carry them with us.  Very dangerous, we decided.

So, back to my old friends at Lehman’s.  The solution:  the deluxe black-and-gold Dietz lantern, the Amish brand-of-choice for a long time.  This lantern holds enough fuel — either lamp oil or kerosene — to burn for more than 24-hours, so you could get through a couple of dark nights easily.  Safer than candles, and more light, too.

My only disappointment:  they’re made in Hong Kong now.   Gives new meaning to “two if by sea.”  Seems even the Amish have gone global in their sourcing.  Anybody know of an American made lantern?  I’ll make that my next purchase.  Stay simple.